Mike,
At the risk of turning this into a logomachy* (new word I learned today, see
below), my experience is different. Here in the School of Education, my Dean
is a Latino male, of the 5(!) Associate Deans, one is a white male, the
others female (one of them African American), 3 of the 5 Department Heads
are female, etc. I don't have a list in front of me but I would bet that
over 50% of the faculty is female. There certainly are vestigial salary and
rank disparities, but these are working themselves out, aided in part by
frequent equity reviews. I can't take personal responsibility for all of
this but I certainly didn't resist it.
So I personally refuse to accept the broad brush strokes that it is white
male faculty who are perpetuating "resistance to diversity initiatives". I
don't believe that any of the administrative appointments mentioned above
were made wholly or even partly based upon gender or race. Gerardo Gonzalez
was the best candidate for dean hands down. The School is prospering in
economic hard times. Is Indiana so unique? So bottom line, there are things
to talk about, there is plenty to do, even by WMF.
*The Word of the Day for February 6 is:
logomachy \loh-GAH-muh-kee\ (noun)
*1 : a dispute over or about words
2 : a controversy marked by verbiage
Example sentence:
"Quarreling about whether 'mathematics' and 'arithmetic'
mean the same thing is nothing but a ridiculous logomachy,"
Sheila declared stoutly.
-----Original Message-----
From: Mike Cole [mailto:mcole@weber.ucsd.edu]
Sent: Tuesday, February 05, 2002 11:10 PM
To: xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
Subject: tomorrow's professor
Don-- The general message of the book, judging from the review, rings true
to me. Our faculty is divided equally between male and female. There are
several non-anglo faculty from various ethnic groups. Our past chair was
a Deaf woman and I believe there is a genuine concern with diversity. But
no one is satisfied with the situation and a lot of the problems mentioned
in the review resonate with my experience here over the past two decades.
The heavy burden for non-anglo-males to be on committees and to be role
models weighs heavily.
At the undergrad level, the social sciences are overwhelmingly female, and
this
is also true in our graduate programs. But, as the reviewer points out, the
higher up the ladder one goes, the less representation of women and
minotiries
one finds. They are eaten alive by the system that took them in.
Might XMCA create its own support program, starting with undergrads, but
especially providing support for grad students in the form of mentoring
groups and networking to help push the other way?
Or is it simply too much trouble? Perhaps not even worth discussing.
mike
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